By Oboh Linus
The Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) in collaboration with the Small Scale Women Farmers Organisations in Nigeria (SWOFON) has urged the Nasarawa State Government to prioritise women inclusion in agricultural policies and budget processes in the state.
Mr Sundayson Chidi, Public Financial Management Programme Manager, Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) Abuja, said this at the two-day stakeholders engagement on systems change in the agricultural sector on Thursday in Lafia.
According to him, records have shown that more than 60 percent of the food eaten in Nigeria is produced women, hence the need for the government to commit more resources and support for women farmers to do better.
He said that given the role women farmers played in the agricultural sector, Government should prioritise their inclusion in budget processes -from the preparation to implementation to enable them to present their challenges and needs.
“Women farmers should be encouraged to do better, more resources should be committed to the needs of women farmers. They have their charters of demands.
“Their needs are too much to meet, they are looking for gender-friendly equipment that they can be used like hand tillers machine that can do what tractors can do and women can handle it.
“This thing can be locally fabricated, the state can invest in it, the state can look at other things like sprayers, harvesters among others,” he emphasised.
Chidi called on the Nasarawa State Government to invest in storage to enable women to store up their farm produce instead of selling them off and not making much out of it.
Mrs Ogechi Okebugwu, Programme Coordinator for Small Scale Women Organisation in Nigeria lamented the exclusion of women in the budget processes – preparation and implementation as well as agricultural policies over the years.
She called on the state government to prioritise the needs of women farmers and include them in budget processes and agricultural policies so that they could make their demands known to them.
“Issues of timely release of farm inputs has been a challenge, farming season is almost here, what measures does the government put in place so that women can access agricultural inputs on time?.
“Most times we have cases where farm inputs distribution come late even after farming season has ended, so, women are pleading with the government to provide space for them to engage timely and also give inputs on time,” she said.
Mrs Jummai Johanna, Chairperson of SWOFON, Nasarawa State chapter, said that she would continue to bring women together to engage with government and relevant agencies to consider women farmers in their programmes.
“We are appealing to the government to include SWOFON in preparation and distribution of farming inputs, women farmers need inputs, if we don’t have support to boost our farming activities we cannot achieve much,” she said.
Speaking separately, Umar Nuhu, Programme Manager, Nasarawa State Agricultural Programme and Polinus Wahe, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Finance, Budget and Planning pledged to carry women farmers along in the programmes of the Government. (NAN)